[Revi]

A big flea market just opened in an old mill building here in our town. It's fun, but I would say that most people are barely making the rent at the place.



The factory building closest to the dam is where it is. It's open on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

It's my new favorite hang -out.

[Ludi]

Enormous boom in retail and housing development at the edges of the large city I'm probably too close to.

No sign of slowing, though local construction has mostly stopped.

Many new retail and office spaces available for lease, some sitting empty for months.

[MarkJ]

We're swamped with plumbing and electrical work, fuel deliveries, annual service, emergency service, repairs, upgrades and furnace, boiler, water heater, tank installations.

We've been turning down work, booking work for spring/summer/fall 2010 and/or sending building, construction, remodeling, plumbing, heating and electrical work to business associates and self-employed independents.

Many of the subcontractors we typically use are booked solid, want to be paid a premium, or paid partially/fully in cash since they're so busy.

Many of the remaining subs/helpers are unlicensed, uninsured, unqualified, unreliable, incompetent corner cutting, code violating hacks that also want to be paid in cash, plus they won't work with plans, approvals, permits, multiple inspections or variances. Many of these subs don't do commercial work and can't handle high end or large residential jobs.

The market is flooded with side jobbers and helpers that have been collecting unemployment and numerous unemployment extensions for over 1-1/2 years. They'll only work for cash since they're collecting unemployment and/or public assistance benefits.

The only local businesses I've seen with little traffic are a few oddball mall stores and a few dollar/bargain type stores and small restaurants, mostly in shopping plaza/strip malls. The turnover of these businesses is high, even during a booming economy.

The local WalMart SuperCenters, Grocery Stores, Convenience Stores, Best Buy and many restaurants and fast food joints are usually packed.

While servicing heating equipment at a hair/nail/tanning salon, I couldn't believe the amount of traffic they had. The dollar/discount store next door was about empty, but traffic in the salon was steady.

Beer, cigarettes, lottery tickets, $5 plus scratch-off tickets, soda, snacks and junk food are still selling well at the convenience stores.

[Gerben]

Not in the US, but I might as well share my story.
I'm in the Netherlands and many companies are reporting an improvement in their sales again. The recession here didn't hit nearly as hard as it did in other countries. Mostly the export-oriented companies have suffered hard from the recession.
I got fired about six months ago from a small trading company that sells both nationally and internationally. Most of my work was related to the CNG business which suffered during the recession, because many companies stopped replacing their old cars. A foreign supplier went bankrupt, which sort of took half the work I did at the company and so I wasn't surprised they let me go when about a third of the workers were fired.
I also did other work for them and they recently contacted me to do some of that work for them again. This is related to components used in manufacturing equipment. They don't want to rehire me, but offered to hire me as a free-lance worker: more than double the pay, but very few hours and no social security: no work, no unemployment benefits.
They seem to be doing well again with everybody complaining how busy they are now they have to do the same work with much fewer people. They are hiring some new people again, but seem to be focussing mostly on cheap inexperienced people. I cost too much.

Anyway I can't complain. I have a few more months of unemployment benefits. Can do some work now and then and have enough savings for another decade. I might continue to just do some odd work now and then and retire for the rest (I'm 35). No fancy cars and stuff for me.

[phaster]

Just got back home from running errands around town and thought I'd share another personal observation about what is happening locally with respect to "doom" and/or "boom"

Wish I had my camera because as they say a picture is worth a 1000 words. Since I didn't picture this, a lush urban canyon park landscape in the forground and a city skyline in the back ground



and this is what it looks like when you're on the freeway



to give ya an idea of what it looks like in this neighborhood park, above the bridge take a look at this picture



anyway I normally don't drive my landcruiser because its kinda a dumb IMHO to drive the beast around town for just running errands,

http://www.phaster.com/road_trips/suv_review_why_they_suck.html

but had to pick some stuff up so that is why I drove it this morning. The one thing about driving around in the landcruiser is it sits up high so I can see more stuff. So I'm driving around this morning, on highway 163 which is the freeway that goes thru the park and noticed beside freeway in the park there were tents set up right beside the freeway in the park for the homeless people to sleep in, and in the back ground there was a new high rise luxury condo tower with amazing views of the city and the park standing empty and big for sale signs in the windows. The juxtaposition of a lush urban park with a small homeless tent village in the fore ground and newly built empty high rise condo towers, IMHO really captures the broad social/economic separation that is happening.

Been around the world, and know there is a great gap between rich and poor in the favelas of brazil, the slums in places like the philippines, india, mexico, etc. but now I don't have to travle to distant third world nations to see this stuff, because its happening right in my own neighborhood!

BTW please notice how lush and green things are here in town, san diego is a desert climate, and this town grew over the years because energy and water was inexpensive and plentiful. Wonder what its going to be like around town a hundred years from now when global population is projected to be over 9 billion people, the southwestern USA most likely will have experienced a prolonged drought, and peak oil will be a well established fact that no will will be able to deny.

[DoomersUnite]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('phaster', 'w')ith all the doom and gloom on main street and the run up in stock market index starting in march of this year, just wondering what "local" signs of "doom" and/or "boom" is everyone seeing in their own neighborhood?

[bshirt]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('leaflight', 'H')ere in Oklahoma , it's seems virtually unaffected by whats going on in IT silicone valley and service sector job markers like California , Michigan cars, New York, Florida.

Mostly here oil/gas coal, cattle , farms, small factories and firms also I live way out in the sticks near a small town and thier putting in a new subdivision, perhaps expecting babyboomer retires moving here because property taxes house prices and land prices here are many times lower, than the east or west coast etc.

Example 5 acres and house , around 1k+ a year property taxes

Also a 3bed house on 20 acres near high employment and near 4 lakes area 120K+ to purchase property

I have a brother in Northern Ga who lives in the hills on 9 acres and its 6k+ a year property taxes.

I heard a story of a retiree who moved to wisconsin on a few acres and was paying 13k year property taxes.

New Jersey Mcmansion avg subdivision house 8K plus a year property taxes.

I'm amazed that in some places you have to make a least minium wage from your pay just to pay property taxes and they call that home ownership.

Having to come up with 400 to 700+ dollars a month to pay property taxes on a house I would not call that a ownership, I call that oweinship.

Oh on foreclosures and bankrupticies 40/60 on avg monthly in the United States , 135,000.Thats a small city or large town going down every month of people places and things in the united states as a whole.

2010 we should see the effects of whats going down and been going down (the doom ) behind the scenes, come to surface more in the mainstream media.

us debt clock org shows stats on foreclosures and bankruptcies happening every minute.

Also bankruptcies were reported to be up 100% since 2007, by some other independent studies.

:

[Revi]

San Diego is gorgeous, Phaster. We have a foot of snow and it looks like this here:



Seriously, we seem to be muddling through this recession around here.

There are a lot more flea market kinds of places, which I love.

I am buying all my X-mas presents locally. Which is a good thing, because I'm broke, and can't get to the mall anyway.

[frankthetank]

Here in southwest WI, it seems to be chugging along like "normal". I've noticed a lot of rentals, a lot of homes still on the market, but then they are building like crazy still (Just built a huge Globe University and an Allergy Associates building) and still a lot of homes being put up. Land prices still seem high $3000/acre locally, although N Wi it has come down. Jobs are still being cut. Trane company (Ingersoll Rand) just cut another 50 last week (Merry Christmas). The stores still seem busy (especially WalMart). I think the food places are busy because in some ways its almost as cheap to eat out as it is to cook at home, if you eat high cal crap from McDs its probably cheaper. I have noticed that Sams Club has just CHOPPED the price of LCD tvs and the price of most items seem to have dropped lately (especially food?) Cheese prices have really come down, along with meat. Maybe thats just a local WI thing? My brother is spending $25K+ on a new SUV, so things must be ok... Gas is still cheap enough where people aren't limiting where they go, from what i 've seen.

[MarkJ]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')'m amazed Americans tolerate these property taxes. Really, don't they make "any" home a rental?

[jdmartin]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('hope_full', 'I') hear there's a recession going on, but from the looks of things in Hampton Roads, Virginia, it's well hidden - especially here at Christmas time.

I just returned from Harry and David's (hoity-toity food/gift store) and the lines at the two cash registers at 11:00 am were five and six deep. This is the store where you pay $29.95 for a box of eight luscious pears. True story.

Article in the local paper said housing prices are steady and home sales have been going along swell.

The contractor I wanted to hire to do a home repair is so busy he can't come by for two weeks and everywhere I see signs of people spending money like they're running a printing press in the basement. It's really a puzzle.

[Roy]

My area isn't doing so well.

Lots of small business that have closed in the last year are still empty with 'For lease' signs in the windows.

Mfg plants have mostly closed.

Lots of planned home developments in my immediate area have stopped. Spec houses that were built and put on the market two years ago are still vacant. There are many 'for sale' signs on houses that have been there for quite a while.

Walmart is still busy as are the fast food restaurant chain stores.

My wife works for a non-profit, and the donations are down in '09 about 60% from their peak in '07.

I think my county is on the front lines, so to speak. The effects are visible everywhere here.

I was in Baton Rouge LA two weeks ago and that place has grown tremendously since I last lived there 4 years ago.

Tons of new retail strip malls (a veritable retail mega-plex) and restaurants. Traffic jams filled with mostly new cars and SUVs.

Guess it all depends on how much federal or state money is coming into an area. Or at least in part.

[frankthetank]

We have to have a glut of office space for lease, but they keep building more. There is one big building that still has a "leasing for summer 2007" sign still up!

[frankthetank]

Couple of pretty sweet stories in the paper here today showing how bad its getting

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Shoplifter caught with tenderloin in trousers

[FairMaiden]

Things here are really good. Last year, everyone freaked out and over-predicted the extent of the recession. My organization employs 30K and expected layoffs of 5% (1500). After things started picking up, that was reduced to 2% (600). Now, they are starting to rehire again. Furloughs have ended and I don't know of one unemployed person...tho I'm sure they are out there. My husband's industry is picking up to the point where he is enjoying picking and choosing his work and charging more. Residential real estate has bounced back to 2007 levels. Everyone is breathing a sigh of relief.

An interesting side note is that I have been fielding tons of questions about peak oil (well, they are worried about resources and whether we have enough any more) from all walks of life. How they know to come to me is beyond me bc I have never broached these subjects with people.

Vancouver city though has cut back on parks boards budget and is trying desperately to cut costs. They seem to be the worst off city - but that doesn't surprise me bc they are the biggest spenders (especially with the Olympics here in 2 months time - they can't cut back on aesthetics!).

Side note about property taxes...I am quite surprised that our taxes are so much lower than yours since everything in Canada (especially where I am) seemed to be more expensive than the US. I pay $1300 per year for a $400K home. Sewage is another $350. And my real estate asked me why I wanted to live in this city when 20 mins away there were cheaper cities, LOL!

[MarkJ]

Property taxes are high in many older urban areas due to declining populations, exodus of the middle class, the upper middle class, the wealthy, businesses and industry to the suburbs and semi-rural areas.

Falling property values, blight, foreclosures, tax seizures and vacant, abandoned or condemned housing and buildings have left many poor cities with much less property tax revenue as well as more lead, asbestos and toxic industrial waste to clean up.

The highest taxed counties in the state spend over 50 percent of property tax revenue on mandated Medicaid spending. The elderly, disabled and public assistance recipients from other counties and states flock to these regions due to their liberal benefits.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Counties Among Highest Taxed

According to figures released by the Tax Foundation, those fears about taxes are justified as Montgomery County is tied for second in the country for homeowners paying the highest property taxes as a percentage of their entire home value from 2005 to 2007.

Montgomery County is tied with three other counties from New York for second place as the homeowners pay an average of 2.9 percent of their property value in property taxes. Orleans County, located west of Rochester, is the highest with homeowners paying an average of 3 percent of their property values.

Overall, 21 of the top 22 most heavily taxed property owners come from New York.

Fulton County is locked in a five-way tie for 14th place with property owners paying 2.5 percent of their property values in property taxes.

So why do Montgomery and Fulton County residents pay such a high amount of their property values in a taxes?

"The biggest thing is that 85 percent of the budget is state mandates that don't have any funding with them," said James Callery, the chairman of the Fulton County Board of Supervisors Finance Committee. "We've got quite a liberal state with the biggest Medicaid program in the country and unfortunately, too many people moved into New York state to get benefits that other states don't offer."


Officials from area counties for the past several years have bemoaned that Medicaid costs mandated by the state is siphoning off a great deal of property tax levy dollars. For example, Fulton County's Medicaid bill will be about $12.6 million in 2009 and will increase by 3 percent every year, as mandated by the state. This year, about 56 percent of the property tax Fulton County residents pay will pay just one bill - Medicaid.

New York state has the most expensive Medicaid program in the nation. New York state is one of the few states that mandate county governments pay a significant portion of the state's costs - 50 percent.

New York spends far more on Medicaid - $2,283 - per capita than any other state and twice the national average - $1,026.

[phaster]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'S')an Diego is gorgeous, Phaster. We have a foot of snow and it looks like this here:



Seriously, we seem to be muddling through this recession around here.

There are a lot more flea market kinds of places, which I love.

I am buying all my X-mas presents locally. Which is a good thing, because I'm broke, and can't get to the mall anyway.